CID Chases Baako Over Woyome

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The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) yesterday undertook what turned out to be a wild goose chase for the source of stories regarding aspects of the Dr. Benjamin Kunbuor and Alfred Agbesi Woyome reportage, which appeared in both the DAILY GUIDE and Crusading Guide newspapers.

At the Crusading Guide where two crack detectives engaged the Editor-In-Chief of the newspaper, Abdul Malik Kweku Baako Jnr, the latter gave the security agents a lecture on the code of ethics of journalism, but without giving out his source.

The detectives were said to have endeared themselves to the Editor-In-Chief whose request to record the interaction was obliged by his guests.

As to the source of his information which formed the basis of his report on Benjamin Kunbuor, they went away empty-handed.

As early as 10:00am, staff of DAILY GUIDE had hints about the intention of the CID headquarters to have a reporter picked up to help in investigations- an euphemism for an arrest- on stories filed on Alfred Agbesi Woyome and Dr. Benjamin Kunbuor.

Regarding the Woyome story, DAILY GUIDE had filed a report in the Tuesday June 19, 2012 edition of the paper with the headline, “Woyome Drops Names”. The story indicated that the embattled NDC financier had, in the early stages of the brouhaha over the illegal payment of the judgment debt, dropped names.

He was reported to have mentioned the names of Valerie Sawyerr, Alex Segbefia, both deputy Chiefs of Staff at the Office of the President, Osu Castle, and Betty Mould-Iddrisu, former Attorney General and Minister of Justice, as being in the know about the payment.

On the Dr Kunbuor shooting story, which appeared in the June 16, 2012 edition and headlined, “Kunbuor Exposed Over Gunshot”, the paper stated that a police report had doubted the veracity of the Attorney General’s story that he was shot at while driving his car at Labone in 2010.

The police report pointed out that in his sitting position and given the entry or exit point of the bullet, it could not have come from outside.

The CID was seeking to establish the source of what perhaps it considered a restricted document regarding the police report.

This and the Woyome story had caused ample embarrassment to the police and the political establishment.

Media watchers had expressed surprise that the CID, given its many years of dealing with the media, would expect practitioners to divulge the source of their stories.

Fortune Alimi, editor of DAILY GUIDE, had in an earlier interview with the Crusading Guide, stated that there was no way DAILY GUIDE would divulge the source of its stories, especially when Dr Kunbuor had not denied the publication on the staged assassination attempt.

The visit to the DAILY GUIDE turned out to be a mere bluff, with the CID limiting its call to the Crusading Guide. It is not known whether it would come today.